The future of social media between opportunities and dangers…

What will be the future of social networks? Between business opportunities and intrinsic risks, we analyze upcoming scenarios and trends

Just as we were about to finish writing this cycle of articles, yet another sad news arrived related to the activities of young people on social media. A 10-year-old girl residing in Palermo she would have died of suffocation following a "challange" undertaken on Tik Tok. It's not the first case, and everything suggests it won't be the last. Unfortunately, social media have also become this: the sounding board of a widespread youth unease, which she already starts at an early age, even before adolescence. The reasons are many and transversal, and it is not our job to venture into social investigations. What is certain is that this disturbing component assumed by social media in recent times is destined to persist in the future as well. Similarly, we can already go too far in stating that alongside the dangers, social media will continue to provide valuable marketing tools to small and large businesses, as well as to individual professionals and entrepreneurs.

And it is perhaps from this dualism that we must start to think about the nature of social media and their evolution. So let's try to fix some fixed points based on the reflections of some of the leading experts in the sector.

• The match will be played on the community

According to the Italian Franz Russo, social media features are now the same everywhere. Simple posts, stories, live videos, advertising… what will change in the future – and is already changing now – it will therefore be the weight of the community who frequents that social media. More generalist and transversal on the American Facebook, younger on the Chinese Tik Tok, more professional on LinkedIn and so on. This trend, according to Franz and others, will end up accentuating in the coming years, determining the moves of businesses and companies that exploit social media as a strategic asset (see our previous article).

• Possible trend reversal

Food marketing and communication expert Valentina Lanza foresees, like many others, a reflux from the current social media binge. Users, especially those who have been using social media since its inception, seem to show the first signs of tiredness. There could therefore be a trend reversal, which will mark a return to offline sociality, perhaps thanks to specific social media. An example of this could be Shoelace, event social media currently under development by none other than the Google team. The target? Facilitate the sociability of people based on the same interests, proximity and other parameters.

• More power to influencers (up to a point)

Influencers could also change the fate of social media. Today they are considered on the same level as public figures, but tomorrow they could become as influential as Hollywood stars. This would cause a breakdown of the paradigms that we all know today: television and cinema would see the appearance of the faces established on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and so on, the same thing for advertisements on the radio, in newspapers and elsewhere. The change is already underway, but it could take on dimensions that are difficult to imagine: a bit like what happened with the actors who are candidates for politics, there could soon be youtubers and instagrammers.

Many hours on Instagram yes, but they are "unimportant"

The unresolved question of privacy in social networks

Alongside the surprises that the future holds for us, there are issues that still seem difficult to resolve. One, the best known and most discussed, is privacy, which we discussed extensively in the third chapter of this excursus (Privacy in the age of mass sharing). Even though we don't yet know what will become of our data - in part we don't even know today - we can say that the survival of social media will be linked to their ability to respect users' personal data, protecting the weakest from cyber bullying , extreme challenges, enticements and what's worse on the web. The immediate success of Signal was emblematic, not a real social media (yet?), but a worthy rival of WhatsApp, which based its rise on a very clear concept: Speak fready. In other words: speak freely. On the home page of the official site, the slogan reads in large letters:

Say “hello” to a different messaging experience. An unexpected focus on privacy, combined with all of the features you expect.

(Welcome to a different conversation experience. You will discover an original focus on privacy, enriched by all the features you expect)

A message, as well as a challenge, able to lay the foundations for one social revolution of epic proportions. Coincidentally, Zuckerberg himself has declared that Facebook will be a Privacy focused social media, i.e. focused on user privacy. Bad tongues could take the announcement (dated 2019) literally, but there are those who hope it is the signal for greater and more genuine data protection. While waiting to find out how it will end, we at Innovando can only invite our reader friends to follow the social pages on Facebook, Twitter e LinkedIn. You will find every month articles and food for thought on the world of the web, a world that between ups and downs continues and will continue to condition our lives and our work. Thank you all for the trust you are showing us. Whatever your plans, we wish you every success!

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